What Price?
by An Artists Account
Summary: [Ficlet] It was Lily who first told me that being beautiful meant being thin. I wish I didn't believe that. - Rose has always been pulled in every direction, trying to live up to impossible expectations. What happens when her world comes crashing down? An in-depth and heartfelt study of illness and loss, friendship and family.
1. The Price of Control

_A.N. Please read this. This story tackles something I know has the ability to destroy lives, something that I feel very passionately about. I know the subject of eating disorders can be controversial so please do not take offence from anything written. _

_Please pm me if there are any parts you wish to discuss. _

**What Price?**

_Part one...The Price of Control_

It was Lily who first told me that being beautiful meant being thin. But we had just finished eating Christmas dinner so maybe she didn't mean thin. Maybe she just meant not fat.

Healthy even, because that is what everyone says.

Being beautiful is being the best you are.

Being beautiful is being at peace inside yourself.

Being happy. Being content.

Being beautiful isn't about being thin.

That's what everyone says.

I wish I could believe that.

Being beautiful is the gap between your thighs and counting your ribs and seeing your hipbones. Being beautiful is being less than size six. Less than small. Less than slim. Being beautiful is being the thinnest.

So why am I so fat?

There are rolls of it around my stomach and my legs wobble as I walk, no matter how many miles I run. My mirror tells me the truth. I am not thin.

It is my obsession, all I can think about.

Everything I eat, swallow, consume.

Every ounce of fat, every gram of sugar.

Every bite of savory, every crunch of sweet.

My stomach twists at the thought.

Rose stares back at me. The light is hitting her hair which is lank and thin. I almost feel that the colour should run, making it as cold as the rest of me. I could be an ice queen, except queens are beautiful, and I am not.

It will be easier tomorrow, when I'm back at school. Less anxious parents peering over you. Less nosey cousins prying into something that isn't any of their business. Tomorrow, I'll only have Scorpius to hide from.

The train is packed but we find a compartment to ourselves near the back, away from the hustle and bustle of the lower years. I can feel him watching me as we sit down opposite each other in the window seats, but when I look at his face he is staring out of the window and not looking at me at all, his face as emotionless as always. He lets nothing show.

It used to be me that made him crack that icy facade. I used to say the silliest things to make him smile. Now though, even the thought makes me tired - a deep weariness that makes me want to curl up and sleep for a hundred years like a princess. Maybe if I slept for a hundred years I would finally be thin.

Scorpius is already dressed in his Ravenclaw robes. Probably to leave any vestiges of his life outside Hogwarts behind, any link to his home. He casts off his name as easily as his robes on the train.

To tell the truth, I wish I hadn't been chosen to be one of Ravenclaw prefects last year. I mean, I was proud. Proud to be asked. Proud because I knew it would make my parents happier with me. But I already felt like Alice, falling down the rabbit hole, desperately trying to keep everything together. At my parent's prodding I had taken an obscene amount of O.W.L.s. Add to that, playing quidditch on the Ravenclaw team to please my dad who, for almost as long as I could remember, had told me that the only thing worth any time at all was quidditch and quidditch players. I ran the dueling club for Albus, who needed the time to focus more on his quidditch career. I tutored the lower years for Professor Venturi who, in addition to teaching arithmancy, was having to cover Muggle Studies after Professor Rotameter left after a nasty accident involving Peeves and a couple of very angry toasters. And then prefect duties, on top of everything else.

This year would be even more difficult, with the beginning of N.E.W.T.s, of which I was taking eight including alchemy, the hardest subject Hogwarts offered. Mum had helped me choose them. She'd been disappointed that I'd wanted to do Muggle Art over Ancient Runes, the O.W.L. I had struggled most with. In the end I'd caved, agreeing to take Runes instead of Astronomy, my other favorite.

"How was your holiday?" Scorpius asked me presently, absentmindedly tracing patterns on the smeary glass. Outside, it was raining and dark clouds were scudding across the brooding sky. It was warm inside the compartment and despite only being just after eleven, the gas lamps hissed and flickered on.

"Fine, I guess." I answered, and then, when he looked directly at me, his eyebrows knitted, I added: "I got a lot of work done."

"Yes, when she wasn't looking after baby Gabby for Victoire and Teddy or helping Lils with her homework or working hundreds of hours at that waitressing job she's got. Did you actually relax for a single day Rosie-Pose?"

I smiled weakly as Al wandered in and sat down next to me. He was smiling at me and nodded to Scorpius too, which was nice of him. He's in Gryffindor, and has his own group of friends but he still spends at least some of the journey to Hogwarts with me each year, like a tribute to that first year. It seems a long time ago now.

Scorpius and I were both placed in Ravenclaw, a surprise to both our families, but not to us. He was too clever to be a Slytherin. I was not brave enough to be a Gryffindor. I was terrified at first that Dad would do as he had been threatening all that summer and disown me but while I felt that he was disappointed that I wouldn't be able to use _my mother's brains_ to score points for his old house he had told me confidentially that _'It could have been worse, it could have been Slytherin' _ which I think he meant as a consolation. When Hugo finally arrived at Hogwarts he was put into Gryffindor, though admittedly after several moments of deliberation by the Sorting Hat. I read the letter Dad sent him the next morning, congratulating him. I never got a letter like that. And while it didn't matter, I always felt that I had to work harder than my brother to gain my dad's approval. Like because I was a Ravenclaw I had to work even harder just to make up for it.

"I went to the beach."

It was the truth. Karen and I had taken Gabby out for the day. Actually, Karen had wanted to teach Gabby to swim but I had flat-out refused. The thought had made me feel sick. The beach had been a compromise even though Karen had nagged and nagged me to swop my baggy jeans and jumper for a bathing suit like her. She didn't understand; she was thin, and confident, and quite happy to wonder around with just her privates covered. I wasn't.

In the end though, it had been nice. I lay in the warm sand and slept while Karen took Gabby in the sea. I had offered to get ice-cream, then said I had already eaten mine on the way back. The beach we frequented was quiet, a cove that only our family, and the occasional dog walker, used. It was peaceful, in a way I hadn't been for a long time. The lack of people meant that I had no need to compare my own, flabby body to the slender tanned flesh of hundreds of people. I caught Karen glancing at me occasionally, obviously wondering why I wouldn't swim anymore when I had been used to be never out of the water.

I had loved swimming as a child. That is how Karen and I had met. We had been part of the same toddler swimming group at Magic Sparks, the day care center in London that we had both been placed in by our respective families. When we both went to Hogwarts, we remained friends. She's in Hufflepuff so we have classes together. She's going out with James now, so we don't spend that much time together though we always smile in the corridors and say hello.

"On, yeah, I forgot about that. Well anyway, I'm going to find Ben and Lisa if you don't mind. I'll be back when the sweet trolley comes around okay Rosie?"

I shrugged and smiled at him, trying to put some energy into my words to make up for being so dreary.

"You bet. We'll catch you later, won't we Scorpius?" But Scorpius had gone back to smeary images on the foggy glass and wasn't looking at either of us. I noticed that he was biting the inside of his cheek. It made a slight indentation in his skin which made his cheekbone more prominent and the hollows beneath more noticeable too. He only did that when he was thinking.

For one paranoid moment I thought that his thoughts might have been directed at me but I swept them aside. Scorpius was observant, but my secret was too well hidden for anyone to see. My mother, who was supposed to see everything, hadn't even guessed. I was safe.

Al left the compartment and Scorpius let his hand fall from the window where the Sorting Hat sat atop a stool. From his pocket he pulled two chocolate frogs, one of which he threw to me. I wasn't ready for it and I didn't reach out in time so it slid through my fingers and hit the floor. My reflexes seemed dull, rusty almost.

Suddenly, I felt so tired like all I wanted was to curl up and sleep and I was cold too, so cold I was almost shaking. I pulled my coat closer about my throat and closed my eyes, ignoring the sound of Scorpius climbing to his feet and scooping up the box from the floor. I curled into myself and, underneath my coat, I pulled at the skin and the fat wrapped around my middle, bolstering my resolve. I was doing so well: three whole days. Even the treacherous rumblings of my stomach had stopped now. After all this time I didn't even really feel the hunger pangs any more. I was better than my body. I was in control.

"Rosie? Are you okay?"

Everywhere I turned there was someone wanting something, wanting some part of me. I was being stretched, thinner and thinner, like a thread that could snap at any time. And when that happened, I wouldn't be able to hold the pieces in anymore. They would fly out, hurting those around me. But most of all they would hurt me: my poor heart, working so hard to try and keep the shards together would collapse and Rose, _mother's brains_ Rose, would be nothing more than an empty shell.

"I'm fine." I said it more sharply than I meant to, and opened my eyes.

The bar that I had set in front of me was so impossibly high. Trying to reach everybody's expectations was like trying to jump for the moon. The more I tried, the further I fell, crashing down, failing more and more each time

He was crouched down in front of me, his eyes on a level with mine.

"You're not fine." He said so simply and I suddenly wanted to cry because how had he seen? Seen in just a glance what my family couldn't, wouldn't see. Seen what, in truth, I wouldn't let myself see either.

It was Lily who first told me that being beautiful meant being thin.

I wish I didn't believe that.


	2. The Price of Falling

**What Price?**

_Part two... The Price of Falling_

The clock behind me was chiming three times, the sudden noise startling the silent air of the Ravenclaw common room. I was studying, trying to get through all the Transfiguration homework I had been given that day. I would normally already have finished but Ollie Wood, the Ravenclaw quidditch captain had been making us do almost daily practices in preparation for our first match in two weeks.

Wood had taken me aside at the end of the session and spoken to me privately.

"You're reactions are terrible." He had said, with no preamble or greeting. "You're out of shape. You're too thin."

Too thin? I would have argued but the practice had left me feeling drained and exhausted and I could barely find the energy to put one foot in front of the other. Too thin? I would have laughed if I hadn't been holding back tears.

"If you don't wake up in practice, I'm kicking you off the team."

I nodded and turned away but he caught my arm.

"Rose, you're one of the best players on this team, we need you for this match. You helped us win the cup two years ago." He looked straight at me. "My sister was like you - quiet, in control. It took over her life, don't let it ruin yours."

I pulled my arm free and picks up my broom. I nodded again and he turned back to the changing room.

I'd sat on the floor of the shower, my knees pulled up to my chest, and let the hot water wash over me. Even through the water was warm I'd still been cold but I was used to that now. I couldn't really remember ever being warm.

I was sat in the chair nearest the fire while I worked now. My eyes were sore and ached as I strained to read the faint print of the heavy text book. I fell asleep, my head resting against it like a pillow.

...

"Oh, I already ate," I told Scorpius as we met in the common room for breakfast the day after the Ravenclaw Hufflepuff match. We'd scraped a win, no thanks to me. I don't think I'd touched the quaffle more than twice. And while Karen and Georgie, my fellow chasers, had covered for me as much as they could, I knew I'd let my dad down by playing so poorly. Not that he would really care, even though he said he wasn't biased, I knew he really wanted Gryffindor to win the cup.

"Really?" Scorpius didn't look convinced.

I shifted uncomfortably. He was watchful, too watchful. My excuses were beginning to sound flimsy, even to me. Karen came up behind us.

"Come down to the Great Hall anyway Rosie, it's like we never hang out anymore so it'll be fun to have some time not working."

"But I've got school-"

She cut me off. "It's Sunday, you need a break. You're working too hard."

I let myself be dragged along without protest. When we reached the Great Hall it was almost completely deserted as most students tended to take advantage of the free morning.

We settled into three vacant seats about halfway along the table and Karen immediately began to pile scrambled eggs onto her plate. She was already biting into a triangle of buttered toast when Scorpius, smiling slightly, reached for a bowl of porridge.

"Fancy a second breakfast Rosie?" Karen asked, between mouthfuls. "These eggs are great."

I shook my head, feeling sick. I should never have agreed to this. I could almost feel the food smells being absorbed into me by osmosis.

Scorpius was watching me, eyebrows furrowed, all trace of his smile gone.

"Have something to eat Rose."

"I told you, I already ate." I tried to avoid his eye by pouring myself a goblet of water. I took a small sip and closed my eyes for the briefest of seconds.

"No, you didn't. I came down to the common room at six this morning and I never saw you. You have to eat."

His words were kind but suddenly I was so tired. So tired of bearing the brunt of everyone else's pity. So tired of not being in control.

"Don't you dare tell me what I need! You have no idea what I need, if you did we wouldn't even be having this conversation!" My voice was loud, loud enough to scare me and I stood up, legs shaking. There was a loud clang and I realised I had dropped my goblet onto the table. It rolled to the edge and hit the floor with another, louder clang. I could feel people watching me from the other tables.

"You don't have a clue!" I screamed at him.

"Rose-" He stood too and put an arm to try an placate me but I smacked it away, "I want to help you."

"Then leave me alone! I don't need your help, I don't want your help!"

Hurt flashed across his face but he said: "You're sick Rose, and you're going to kill yourself if you don't let me help you!"

"I HATE YOU!" Tears were pouring down my face even as a tiny, treacherous, part of me wanted to sink into the embrace he offered me. Tell him everything. Let him save me.

But how could he save me when I couldn't even save myself?

"I love you Rose." He said the words so simply, like there could be no doubt, like it was easy. But it never is that easy so I turned and ran.

There was a bathroom a few corridors over, a girl's bathroom that I knew he wouldn't be able to follow me into. It was empty as I locked myself into a cubicle and retched and heaved over the toilet basin. But nothing came. My empty stomach could produce no more, not even bile or blood.

Shaking I unlocked the door and stared at myself in the mirror over the sinks. Dark eyes, bruised from lack of sleep stared back at me and then I saw Karen's dark hair. She was stood behind me, her expression, for once, serious.

"How did I not know Rose?" She said quietly. "How did I not see? You're my best friend. I should have known. I'm sorry."

It was such a reversal from the way I saw things. To me, her knowing was the biggest failure of all, my inability to hide the most broken and weakest part of myself from anyone. To her, knowing made her stronger, made her able to help.

She pulled me into her arms and I struggled for a moment but she didn't let go and for that I was grateful for, more than anything. In that moment, when it could have gone in so many different ways, she held onto me, and pulled me through with her.


	3. The Price of Discovery

**What Price?**

_Part three... The Price of Discovery_

The hospital says I might never have children.

The hospital says that my body may never mend.

The hospital says that I have an eating disorder.

They are wrong on all three accounts.

I hate what they are doing to me. I hate not being allowed anywhere on my own in case I binge or purge. I hate that every mouthful I swallow is monitored and calculated.

But most of all I hate how I can't see anyone. I hate how alone I feel, though not so long ago it was what I thought I wanted.

I get letters though. Every single day. And not just letters from my mother and father but notes from my cousins, chatty and relaxed. They send me articles cut out from the Daily Prophet that they think will interest me and crossword puzzles which I sit and do, perched on my windowsill overlooking the green gardens hidden from the Muggle street. Karen sends me funny pictures that she draws, little cartoons of teachers and students at Hogwarts. She sends me poems and rhymes too, limericks to make me laugh.

Scorpius writes most of all. Several times a day at least. He writes from the heart and he signs each one with a simple kiss.

I write back to him the most.

When they finally let me have visitors I see mum and dad first. They have Hugo with them and he looks upset. He's only fifteen and guilt rises up inside me for what I have put him through, put them all through.

We sit and talk for a long time and I finally tell them how unhappy I was, how I never felt I was enough. Mum has tears falling down her cheeks when I finish and she pulls me into her lap and enfolds me in her arms, like she used to do when I was a small child.

"I'm sorry," She says, "I'm so, so sorry."

Maybe that was what I wanted all along. An apology. But now I don't think it is. So buried in her shoulder I repeat her words back to her.

"I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry."

When they are about to leave Hugo pulls me aside. He's taller than me and larger, more powerfully built but when he hugs me he does it tentatively, like he's scared he'll break me if he holds too tightly.

"I brought you something." He says, and from a pocket he pulls my dog-eared copy of The Tales of Beedle the Bard. Mum gave it to me on my eleventh birthday. I haven't read it in so long but in this moment it seems like the right thing.

"Love you little brother." I smile but he doesn't.

"I love you sis," He says, "So you have to get better. I need you too. Who else is going to help me with my charms homework or teach me how to read music or tell me stories when I can't sleep?"

He leaves soon after, promising to bring others to visit me when he comes back.

I sit on my own in my bedroom and trace the runes that tell the stories I know so well. I read until it is time for the healer's to make their rounds.

My healer knocks once on my door and pokes his head around it.

"How are you feeling Rose?" He asks.

"Okay." I say. And then, for the first time in almost as long as I can remember, I add: "Hungry."

Healer Swift smiles.


	4. The Price of Our Future

**What Price?**

_Part four... The Price of Our Future_

When they finally let me out of the hospital, I didn't go back to school. There was only four weeks left before the summer anyway, too late for me to try for my exams. Professor Venturi said that I could progress into seventh year without completing my sixth. The hospital commended this effort.

There were stipulations of course. I dropped Arithmancy and Ancient Runes. Six N.E.W.T.s, I found, I could keep up with easily by working in my free periods and two evenings a week. I was forbidden from playing quidditch and exercising as much as I had. I passed running the Dueling Club onto Karen, who had decided that being an Auror was definitely in her tealeaves, and wanted the experience.

There were good days and bad days. Sometimes I would think that I was really getting better, eating three meals in one day. But other days, mum would be tired and snap at one of my dad's thoughtless comments and the food would turn to ash in my mouth. I would stare down and it would all I could do to control my stomach. Sometimes and would toss and turn in bed until I got up and emptied my stomach into the toilet.

That next September first was difficult too, but in a different way. No-one really knew why I'd dropped out halfway through last term and rumours were everywhere. Some made me laugh. Some made me want to cry. I began to focus more on my art, rather than my academics and, for the first time in ages, I was working hard for me, not to prove to my mother that I could be as smart as her. I wasn't picked to be head girl, which I was secretly very pleased about. The best part was that Karen was picked instead, which meant that even though my mother was disappointed, she knew that someone far more deserving than me was there to help. Karen was always made for leadership.

Throughout everything though, Scorpius was a constant. He made me laugh, saying the silliest things to make me smile. Looking after me made him stronger too, in ways neither of us could have guessed.

I achieved six outstanding N.E.W.T.s, an achievement that I was proud of not for my parents sake but for myself. I went on to train at St Mungo's, working in the teen faculty, helping people like me. Scorpius and I eventually got married.

The hospital said three things. In the end, they were right about all three.

Scorpius and I were never able to have children. My two years of self imposed starvation had taken its toll on my body. I never had a regular cycle after that and suffered two miscarriages. I never really forgave my teenage self for that.

I am thirty seven now. I have never dieted to that extend since. I am a healthy weight and swim every day.

Today is September the first and Scorpius and I am stood on the platform with steam from the brilliant red train billowing around us. Many of my nieces and nephews are starting Hogwarts today as well Alfie, our adopted son.

He is beautiful, with dark skin and eyes and mischievous grin that is infectious. I love him more than I can say. I'm strong for him now. He's my anchor. Him and Scorpius.

I love my work. I love family. But most of all, I like myself now. I respect that I can't please everyone so now I do what I can without worrying about the rest.

Tomorrow will take care of itself. I need to look out for today.

Throughout my life I have thought about what those two years cost me, the price I paid to hide away. It was a high price. But I could pay it. The price of our future is more important to me now, because that future is Alfie.

I want him to grow up in a world where nothing has to be secret. I don't want him to have to pay the same price I did.

Karen is stood beside me. Her two children are starting Hogwarts this year too. Libby and John are already friends with Alfie. I hope Alfie will be as good a friend to them as Karen was to me.

A whistle blows and the scarlet train begins to pull slowly out of the station. Scorpius is gripping my hand tightly.

"He'll be alright." Scorp tells me and I nod, stroking my thumb over his.

"I know he will."

The train is gathering speed now, pulling away into the distance. It could almost be a scarlet dragon, twisting out of sight between the hills.

* * *

So there we are, a happy ending. This has been a very important story to me, and I hope that if any of this has raised any questions or feelings let me know. I have tried to be as sensitive to this topic as possible so let me know your thoughts.

Thank you.

A.A.A.


End file.
